蘑菇AV

Gen Z shoppers embrace Temu, Shein, and TikTok Shop: 1 in 4 makes a purchase at a Chinese online marketplace at least once a week, as their array of cheap, trendy goods proves impossible for the price-sensitive cohort to resist.

The beauty brand鈥檚 sales increased 50% YoY for the latest quarter. In August, e.l.f. went for the gold, capitalizing on Olympics momentum by working with medal-winning athletes such as gymnast Gabby Douglas and swimmer Anastasia Pagonis. 鈥淚t鈥檚 so smart for a beauty brand to partner with Olympians, because no one's makeup is staying put better than those Olympians,鈥� said Lebow. 5. ThredUp.

This spring, Boots plans to tap into social commerce opportunities by launching a TikTok shop for its No7 brand. Viral trends drive sales. The 鈥渄olphin skin鈥� trend helped boost sales of prestige face creams, face serums with hydrating properties, face mists, radiant foundations, and highlighters in the UK last year, per NPD. Beauty influencers aren鈥檛 influential with all consumers.

However, several other platforms have similarly sought to evolve into social commerce before pulling back due to a lack of interest. For example, Meta last year pulled back on several social commerce features, including Instagram鈥檚 Shop tab, as it sharpened its focus on driving advertising revenues. The big takeaway: TikTok faces an uphill climb to attract more sellers.

On today's podcast episode, in our "Retail Me This, Retail Me That" segment, we discuss whether TikTok Shop will face the same challenges as Instagram's social commerce efforts, how much Amazon's partnership with Meta's social media platforms will affect TikTok, and if TikTok Shop is ruining TikTok. Then in a newish segment, "Loyalty Point, Counter Point," we discuss whether Instagram or TikTok has a better overall ecommerce experience. Join our analyst Sara Lebow as she hosts analysts Sky Canaves and Blake Droesch.

Go further: Read our Social Commerce Forecast 2023 report for an in-depth analysis of the key trends shaping social commerce.

The trend: While live shopping is yet to fully take off in the US, some companies are trying to find the right formula to unlock sales. Best Buy announced a series of live shopping events in partnership with Talk Shop Live to be held throughout November in the lead up to the Cyber Five.

While social commerce is on the rise in the US, livestream commerce has yet to take off. In addition, advances in technology (like ChatGPT) may help jumpstart voice commerce adoption. Here鈥檚 what marketers need to know to take advantage of the increase in physical and digital shopping channels.

What trends will we be talking about this year? Consumer behaviors will be shaped by continued uncertainty and cultural trends spilling over into commerce.

The big takeaway: Brands that are serious about live commerce will have to invest in building communities before they can focus on driving sales. That means finding the right talent鈥攃reators who are capable of both getting shoppers to tune in, and of finding new ways to connect with them day after day.

Despite 79% of consumers reporting that rising inflation impacted their spending in Q1, Amazon increased sales across 14 of 24 product categories, per Jungle Scout. Quality also matters to Amazon shoppers, with 64% saying they鈥檙e influenced by products with the best ratings/reviews and 60% saying they鈥檙e influenced by product ratings/reviews with photos or videos. 2.

Walmart is launching its first shoppable video series: The first episodes of the holiday-themed 鈥淎dd to Heart鈥� will be available on Roku, TikTok, and YouTube beginning on Dec. 2.

Social commerce success hinges on the platform. Brands that want to experiment with social commerce this holiday season need to make sure they鈥檙e targeting the right audience on the right platform. For example, Gen Z prefers to make purchases on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok, according to Jungle Scout. But Facebook is the platform of choice for the general US population.

Time spent on media and consumer spending are plateauing, making one company's gain another's loss. Diving into these market dynamics, we explore innovative strategies for advertisers and retailers to win consumers in the new digital era.

Amazon is the largest retail marketplace in the US, bringing in $328.30 billion in sales, per our forecast. eBay comes in second ($35.02 billion), followed by Walmart ($10.64 billion). Other marketplaces, like Shein and Temu, are also fighting for their share of consumer dollars by offering lower prices than competitors.

TikTok sister app Douyin is a livestream behemoth in China, where nearly 40% of internet users also engage in livestream shopping, according to our forecast. But in the US, the format hasn鈥檛 caught on in the same way.

Social commerce is also growing, with 33% of US adults ages 18 to 34 making purchases on social platforms like Instagram and TikTok, according to an April 2024 蘑菇AV survey. Additionally, 20% of Gen Z shoppers in Walmart鈥檚 survey think shopping through social media makes the experience more convenient and enjoyable. Social media is a must to reach younger consumers.

While most online marketplaces have policies in place prohibiting the sale of counterfeit goods, identifying those sellers鈥� accounts and removing the listings can feel like a game of Whac-A-Mole given that new listings routinely pop up soon after others are removed.

For that reason, retailers should continue to experiment with live shopping as a brand-building opportunity and as part of an omnichannel approach, rather than primarily as a sales driver.

The full US rollout of TikTok Shop in September has made impulse social commerce purchases even easier, as it鈥檚 allowed marketers to convert shoppers through video content or livestreams. Obstacle: Is seamless online checkout too seamless? The quick, efficient nature of online shopping can leave little room for consumers to consider adding items.

Gen Z-oriented fashion brand Cider sold over 100,000 items on the platform, with a two-piece knit dress accounting for roughly a third (over 34,000 units) of those sales due to a handful of viral videos featuring the product that have been viewed over 80 million times.

Merchants will be able to access order and customer information from TikTok sales via their Shopify dashboards. But beginning on Sept. 12, Shopify sellers will no longer be able to sync their product catalogs to TikTok and feature items in a dedicated tab, and instead will have to switch over to TikTok Shop.

ByteDance is dead set on building up TikTok Shop in the US: Its aggressive moves to build a robust shopping service could lead to a $500 million loss this year.

Meta and Amazon are testing Amazon product sales inside Instagram and Facebook. The partnership between X (formerly known as Twitter) and Google demonstrates what happens to platforms struggling to attract sufficient advertisers. Some of these companies appear dominant in their respective markets.